Virtually since the invention of the telephone by Alexander Graham Bell in 1876, it has been recognized that a unique telephone number for notifying authorities of emergencies (crime, fire, injury . . . ) would be a tremendous boon to public health and safety.
Britain implemented its first emergency telephone system in 1937 using the number 999. This British system serving police, fire and Emergency Medical Service (EMS) was developed after fatal delays in phone calls reporting a fire on Wimpole Street. In 1957 the National Association of Fire Chiefs in the United States suggested a single number for reporting fires. In 1958 New Zealand instituted its 111 emergency telephone number. In 1959 the police department in Winnipeg Canada introduced North America's first emergency telephone system. President Lyndon Johnson's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice issued a report in 1967 that recommended a single number for emergency calls that should be used nationwide.
In cooperation with AT&T (the predominant telephone carrier at that time), the designation of 9-1-1 as a universal emergency number was announced in January of 1968. The first 9-1-1 system was adopted in California in 1970. In the mid 1970s California's Alameda County launched the first 9-1-1 system that provided for selective routing of 9-1-1 calls. Prior to this pilot project, all 9-1-1 calls were routed according to “hard wired” instructions in the switching systems of the telephone companies. This original pilot program provided the county's Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) with the Automatic Number Identification (ANI) of the caller.
Although the selective routing of 9-1-1 calls has evolved and, for the most part, has worked very well for landline telephones, the prevalence of wireless communication devices (cell phones) presents new challenges.
The number of subscribers in the United States using wireless services grew from 55 million in 1997 to 253 million in 2007. Worldwide there are 2.3 billion wireless subscribers. Eight percent of the United States population uses cell phones with a volume of 2 trillion wireless minutes in 2007. Twelve point eight percent of United States households are “wireless only.” Californians alone placed 23.3 million 9-1-1 calls in 2007. Of these, 11.6 million (50%) were made from wireless devices. Current estimates are that 58% of 9-1-1 calls are wireless.
In an emergency situation, the first instinct of these cell phone users is top call 9-1-1 using their cellular devices. Their next thoughts can be to call loved ones or others to inform them of the emergency situation. This entails remembering the loved ones phone numbers, or looking them up on the phone's favorite contacts list and dialing the number. In an emergency or other stressful situation, this can be difficult and sometimes impossible.